New Book!

Learn the creative mindset and acquire the technical tools necessary for improvisation. These concepts and exercises will help you to discover a deeper source of music-making, a greater quality of authenticity, and a discernible change in sound and phrasing that will enhance your performance of written music. You will learn to play by ear, apply musical theory to your instrument, and engage creatively with the elements of music, giving you a long menu of musical options. The accompanying recording includes demonstration and play-along tracks.

You will learn:• to connect melodic imagination to your instrument, with an enhanced sense of physicality• how to use scales, chords, modes, progressions, and other structures in your improvisations• a broad rhythm vocabulary• improvisation techniques for standard progressions, such as blues and II Vs• to create richer lines by using approach notes, neighbor tones, and embellishments into an improvised melodic line.

Eugene Friesen is active internationally as a cellist, composer, teacher, and recording artist. A graduate of the Yale School of Music, he has performed widely with the Delos String Quartet, the multiple Grammy-winning Paul Winter Consort, Trio Globo, and as a soloist and clinician. He is a professor at Berklee College of Music in Boston.

"Destined to be a classic in the field." -- David Balakrishnan, founding violinist with the Grammy award-winning Turtle Island String Quartet

"This book is a great resource and guide for aspiring improvisers of all ages. I highly recommend it to my fellow musicians." -- Jeremy Cohen, multiple Grammy-nominated violinist, composer, arranger (Quartet San Francisco and Violinjazz)

"I think this is an invaluable and timeless work that will inspire classical musicians for generations to come." -- Howard Levy, multiple Grammy award-winning composer, pianist and harmonica player; member of the Flecktones and Trio Globo

"This invaluable resource is an important contribution to the evolving curriculum of classical music education in the 21st century." -- Matt Haimovitz, Grammy-nominated cellist, professor of cello at the Schulich School of Music at McGill University